


Stay With Me

by cgf_kat



Series: Next to Me [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Captivity, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Kids, Last humans, MCD is in the past, Plance Kids, Prisoners, Science Experiments, So Many Kids, Torture, Whump, Worst Timeline, plance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:55:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23641189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cgf_kat/pseuds/cgf_kat
Summary: Pidge kisses his cheek. “I know what’ll make you feel better.”Lance puts on a quiet smile. “I’m fine, really.” It isn’t the first time he’s seen himself, or Pidge, or the people he once loved in a young face he’s never seen before.“Still.” She sits back and pulls something from the pocket of her long tunic--a small piece of ore and purple circuits.He blinks. “Is that…?”***It's been more than fifteen years since Earth and Voltron were destroyed. Fifteen years that Lance, Pidge, and their children have been held as prisoners and experiments on Emperor Sendak's flagship.They may be the last humans, but that doesn't mean they've given up.
Relationships: Lance/Pidge | Katie Holt
Series: Next to Me [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1701799
Comments: 3
Kudos: 30





	Stay With Me

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much to Rueitae for letting me play in her brand new sandbox!

Lance holds Pidge against his chest, humming contentedly as he nuzzles into the soft hair at her neck. Her back is warm against his body, her fingers laced with his across her chest. It would be better if the lights were dimmer--easier to drift into a nap--but this is just a stolen moment. 

The fresh sheets under them crinkle, reminding him about the pile of dirty ones on the floor just beyond their feet. He only has to carry them to the chute, but still. 

“You’re warm,” he mumbles. 

Warmer than the crisp recycled air of their quarters biting at his bare toes. They should have grabbed one of the blankets before they crashed to the mattress to test the sheets. 

“I’m warm?” she teases, glancing at him over her shoulder.

“You’re practically a space heater.”

Pidge snorts out a laugh. “Share your body with an alien, and you, too, can be your own space heater.” She frees her fingers to twist toward him, slowly, pausing to rub at her large belly. “Oh. Oof. Speaking of, someone’s awake.”

She settles on her other side, letting her head drop against his chest. Lance loops his arms back around her and draws absent patterns on her back with a finger. He winces over her shoulder. 

“Has the Doc told you anything yet…?” She saw him this morning. Maybe by now, so close to full term...

Pidge lets out a heavy breath. He can feel the rush of air up his neck and slipping down the front of his tunic. “No. Not this time.”

“Still nothing?”

“Not a word.” 

They both go silent for a while, trying to take advantage of the time to themselves. It doesn’t last in quiet much longer before Pidge pushes up to sit against the headboard. Her hands spread over her belly as she sighs. 

“He’s never just...not told me before. Even when the DNA was—” She stops, making a face. They don’t talk about it, because it doesn’t matter. Rys is their son, and whoever says different can fight him. 

It’s not as if Sendak has ever taken any interest in the boy anyway. He probably only insisted Doctor Azot use his DNA just to screw with them. 

Lance sits up to pull her against his shoulder. “Maybe it’s got six legs.”

Pidge giggles and he knows his plan has worked. “Or three heads,” she adds.

“Or wings!”

She shakes her head at him without lifting it from his shoulder. “How was your morning?”

He just shrugs, because he isn’t sure he wants to answer that. Maybe that’s why he pulled her down onto the bed with him. “I...uh…they let me take the kids to the gym while you were with the Doc.” 

Pidge, bless her, can tell when something isn’t right. She frowns up at him. “What is it?”

Lance hesitates. “I just...I think I saw one of the others. She had blue skin, but...she looked like my mom. And Veronica. M-my sister, you know, not our Veronica.” 

Just a girl in the corridor, with a Galra teacher, being ushered past them in the other direction as their own guards marched them to the gym on the next level. He couldn’t have seen her for more than ten or fifteen seconds, but he would have known those eyes anywhere. 

Pidge snuggles closer, curling her fingers through his between them. “Lance…”

“She couldn’t have been more than seven or eight, but she looked so serious.”

Pidge doesn’t say anything. There’s nothing to say to that, really. It’s part of their reality, now. For more than fifteen years as slaves on Sendak’s flagship. No control over their lives, their bodies, their very DNA. 

The last of humanity, reduced to trophies and science experiments.

Pidge kisses his cheek after a long few moments. “I know what’ll make you feel better.”

Lance puts on a quiet smile. “I’m fine, really.” It isn’t the first time he’s seen himself, or Pidge, or the people he once loved in a young face he’s never seen before. 

“Still.” She sits back and pulls something from the pocket of her long tunic--a small piece of ore and purple circuits.

He blinks. “Is that…?”

“Second-to-last piece. It’s not exactly what I was looking for, but I can make it work. The repair technicians in Doc’s lab should have been more careful of what they left out.”

A rush of air pushes past his lips as Lance smothers a laugh. “You are...amazing. I love you.”

They may be the last of humanity, but that doesn’t make them helpless. 

***

“Mom, look! I did all my math!” 

Little hands with four fingers rather than five push up into Pidge’s face as she comes into the common room, showing off a computer tablet of completed problems. She grabs the edges to steady it, glancing over the numbers as Ramie bounces on his toes at her feet.

“Whoa! Hey...yeah, good job!”

“Are they right?”

“I think so; I’ll look at them better in a dobosh or two, okay?”

“Can I go read now?” he asks. The flaps above his eyebrows that give away his Olkari heritage quiver in excitement. 

Pidge hands back the tablet with a smile. “Of course you can.”

Lance comes in behind, poking his head over her shoulder. “Your English and Spanish are done too?” he asks.

“Yep!” 

Pidge laughs as he bounces off. “I don’t know what we’re going to do with that one.” 

Seven years old and a voracious reader. She wishes they had human books for him to read, but at least Doctor Azot has been able to supply them with more than enough Galra, Olkari, and other texts, downloaded to the tablets they use to write the kids’ lessons. None of the tablets in their quarters have any access to the networks on the rest of the ship, or many capabilities at all--they know her too well--but they’re better than nothing. At least their keepers are letting them educate their children at all. 

She wishes, too, that they could teach Ramie the Olkari language, but she doesn’t remember much of it. Any Olkari texts on their tablet are translated. She doesn’t know what happened to the Olkari slave who provided the other half of the boy’s DNA, either. She never met him. 

At least everything has been done through insemination or implantation, except for Sam, Veronica, and Leo, who are entirely theirs. Neither she nor Lance has been forced to be with anyone else.

“Much more reliable success rate this way,” the Doc told her years ago when she asked, grumbling in his usual way. “Particularly with inter-species breeding. Much better to test the genetic material outside the womb first. Make sure the embryos are viable.”

One small mercy in a host of indignities.

Leo is down for a nap in the boys’ room. Rys, Veronica, and Sam are spread out across the common room on their tablets. Lance settles backward on a chair between Rys and Veronica. 

“How’s it going?” he asks. Veronica starts complaining about her own math. “Yeah, I feel you, kid. Let me see?”

“Where’s Elia?” Pidge wonders aloud. “She was supposed to be finishing that essay for me.”

Their oldest, Sam, looks over his tablet from the couch. “I think she’s in the girls’ room.”

The lights are dim in the small bedroom the two girls share. The space is barely large enough for the two single beds, but there’s enough room behind the far one for the fourteen-year-old shape huddled between it and the wall. Quiet sniffles give her away. 

“Elia?”

Blue eyes nearly identical to Lance’s peer over brown knees drawn up to her chin. Unlike Rys, who has purple-tinged skin and yellowed eye-whites under his brown hair, Elia looks entirely human. Like Keith had. She looks just like her father. 

“Mom?” She mumbles. Another sob escapes. “I mean…” 

“Hey, hey…” Pidge eases onto the edge of the bed beside where the girl has hidden herself and reaches down to offer her a hand. “You don’t have to call me anything else, remember? I still want to be ‘Mom’ if you want me to be…”

Elia pulls herself up beside Pidge by the offered hand and latches on. It isn’t the first time in the last few days she or Lance have held her while she cried. 

They were always going to tell her, but the Doc had to go and tell her before they were ready. Not that he meant it maliciously. Doc isn’t like that. He probably didn’t even know she didn’t know. 

Pidge holds onto her, the warm tears dripping onto her skin through the cutout in her tunic strategically open over the brand on her shoulder. The signet of Sendak’s Galra Empire. 

She and Lance may not have been forced to wear standard prisoner garb for quite some time now, but everything they’re given has these blasted cutouts or sheer areas. Right there. Because of course they do. 

As if Sendak would ever let them forget their situation. 

She thinks this time is the same as the others. Elia just needs someone to hold her. She just needs to know that who her other parent is doesn’t matter. But this time it’s a different thought she voices when she calms enough to talk.

She sniffs while she swipes at her eyes, Pidge still holding onto her arms to keep her steady. 

“Just...if you’re not really exactly my mom, and Dad isn’t really Rys or Ramie’s dad...then they’re not really my brothers at all, are they?”

All of the kids have some sort of idea about Rys and Ramie, since it’s more clear they don’t look the same as the rest of them. But they’re all close. They always have been. They have their fights like any other siblings, but they’re the only friends any of them have. 

“What? Of course they are.” Pidge kisses her forehead. “If who your mother ‘technically’ is doesn’t matter to me, or your dad, why would it matter to them?”

“I-I don’t know, I just...I just always thought they were but they’re not and, and I want you to be my mom but—and—” She stops, seemingly unable to articulate what’s bothering her any more than that. 

Pidge pulls her close again, stroking her hair. “I know...I know it’s got to be hard to get used to. And it’s okay to be sad. As long as you know nothing’s going to change how much we love you, okay?”

A small nod against her shoulder is her only answer.

***

When Pidge comes back out into the common room, a hand on his shoulder asks Lance to stay with the kids for a little while. A flick of her eyes toward the bedroom asks him to check on Elia again soon, and he understands that, too. Lance answers with a silent nod, letting her go back into the bedroom on her own. 

He knows what she’s doing. What he doesn’t expect is the amount of clanking and muttering from the closet when he seeks her out later. The hidden panel at the back of the small space is still open, components strewn across the bedroom floor around the closet door. Pidge is cross-legged against the wall with a small soldering tool in her hand. 

She’s never given up her preference for the floor, even though it’s clearly more inconvenient whenever she’s quite this far along.

“Pidge? You all right?”

Something about the set of her shoulders and the more-muttering-than-usual is concerning him.

“Pidge?” He has to ask again before she notices him there. 

“Hmm?” She only glances up for a moment. “Oh...yeah. Just trying to fit this chip.” 

Lance hums in understanding and sits beside her. That isn’t everything, and he knows it, and she knows he knows it. He waits for her to finish her soldering and replace the piece she’s working on in the main body of the computer and encrypted transmitter she’s building. Then it’s just sitting there, at her feet. 

After a while, she lets out a long breath. “Sometimes I feel like if I stare at it long enough it’ll just be...done. Almost sixteen quiznaking years...” 

They have to give it to the Galra for being smart enough to keep Pidge away from any fully functioning computers. If they hadn’t cut off their quarters entirely from the beginning, they would have been out of here a long time ago. 

Instead, it’s been an agonizingly long process of sneaking and scrounging for the parts she needs to build something she can use to either make contact with someone who can help or finally access the systems here on Sendak’s ship. 

Lance tugs playfully at the end of her long ponytail. “What happened to being excited we’re down to one piece?”

“Elia,” Pidge says quietly. She glances up toward the common room, swallowing. “...all of them.”

He winces, slides closer on instinct. “I know.”

She glares down at the device at her feet. “So close, but the piece I still need is going to be the hardest to get. It could still be months or  _ more _ .”

“I know. We’ll get there.”

Pidge’s hands go to her belly, eight months along with another child that could very well be taken from them. To be raised apart from them for “science” or given away to one of Sendak’s regional rulers as a hybrid novelty. 

“W-what if—” 

She doesn’t finish her sentence, but he knows. Lance isn’t the only one with children out there he didn’t get the chance to raise. Pidge has given birth to more than the six children out there waiting for them. Every day in their faces he sees the shadow of the others that were ripped away from them, and he can’t imagine how much worse it is for her.

He isn’t sure if Pidge notices her arms drifting up, cradling a child that isn’t there as she shakes her head and tries to change the subject. “We should tell Elia about Elijah. She’s hurting enough right now but...later? But soon? I don’t know...but she deserves to know she has a twin brother. Quiznak, he could even be on this ship still…”

It was the first time the Galra took a baby away from them. The first time they cried together all night...at least for that reason. More than a year with him, loving him...before they took him for a checkup as soon as he was mostly weaned, and never brought him back. 

Lance lets his head rest against hers, grimacing against the pressure in his throat. “You’re right. I want her to know.”

“Did uh…” Pidge sniffs. “Have you checked on her since I—?”

He nods. “She told me, too.”

“She loves her brothers so much! And the idea she wasn’t actually related to either of them is the part killing her now. I hate it. It’s like…” Her hands make a vague impression in the air of stacking, layers, one thing after another, before they go back to her stomach. 

“Yeah,” Lance agrees. 

His chest aches, and he wishes he could tell Pidge that they’ll get out of here before this child is born. Even not knowing who’s DNA they’ve crossed with hers this time or what the child will look like...it’s not important. This child matters. They all matter. 

Pidge doesn’t say anything else, and neither does he. The only promises they can make, they’ve already made. 

***

_ Fifteen Years Ago _

“I  _ warned _ you both that there would be consequences if you were to continue to purposefully cause trouble for your guards,” Azot huffs. “They were not going to be content with a few blows here and there indefinitely.”

Lance is still trying to breathe. His body is still trembling from the aftershocks of the energy forced through it, and it was all for nothing anyway.

They didn’t bring him to the doctor’s lab as he’d hoped. He still doesn’t know where Pidge is, or why. She’s been gone for nearly two movements. Azot and Sendak alike have pulled them out individually for one reason or another, but it’s never been for this long. 

“Fine,” Lance gasps, with no shortage of sarcasm. “You were right.”

“Of course I was,” Azot grumbles. 

The doctor pulls a small contraption from his case that looks like nothing if not a pair of glasses with curled earpieces, except there are short tubes at the front of the curve rather than lenses. Azot fits the curved pieces over Lance’s ears and the tubes into his nose, not at all gentle about it. Lance coughs, the rubber-like tubes irritating at first, but after a soft beep there’s merciful air. Help to breathe. He doesn’t know how it’s doing that with no clear air intake or oxygen supply, but space is strange.

Everywhere is strange. The only places that weren’t are gone now. Earth, the castle…

Lance clenches his eyes shut to avoid tearing up as he catches his breath. When he finally opens them again nothing has changed. He’s still staring up at the bare ceiling of their cell, and Doctor Azot’s scowl.

That’s when he registers the fact that Azot used the word ‘purposeful.’

“Wait,” he croaks. “I wasn’t—”

“You were. I may be a scientist, but I am not a fool.”

Lance snorts, but it hurts his sore throat. He groans quietly, curling on his side. “What, no quintessence?”

“I also cannot continue to use quintessence indefinitely to heal you. Even small doses will have a cumulative effect over time, and to heal this more quickly would take more. I cannot risk altering your physiology. No real lasting damage has been done, as long as this isn’t a common occurrence. You will live.”

“Right…”

Azot packs up everything else save for the device on Lance’s face. “I will leave the breathing monitor with you for the time being. It will self-adjust to assist you until your throat and lungs have recovered. See that this doesn’t happen again.”

“No promises.” That earns him a glare as Azot gets up to go, but though he’s sure his chances of getting an answer are slim now, Lance tries anyway. “Wait. Pidge…”

The doctor stops just short of the door. His shoulders shift as if he sighs, but he doesn’t turn around again. 

“She will be returned to you shortly,” Azot’s gruff voice answers.

Then he’s gone, and Lance can finally breathe. 

***

_ Now _

Their breakfast—food goo embellished, at least, with some sort of berry--is interrupted by the heavy main door to their quarters opening again. Too soon for the guards to be coming back to collect the dishes. 

Instead Doctor Azot’s decidedly un-military figure shuffles quickly inside, grumbling at the guards as he passes.

“Doc!” Sam calls. He grins as he jumps up from the table. “Have you gotten approval for me to observe in your lab more? I could come today! We don’t have lessons!”

Azot’s eyebrows go up, as if he hadn’t expected the question even though it’s all Sam has talked about Azot suggested the possibility. 

“I...have not had the chance to consult my superiors.” His attention shifts quickly to Pidge and Lance. “We need to speak.”

Pidge is already frowning. Brushing Sam off so quickly isn’t like him. Azot has always seemed to have a soft spot for their oldest, especially since his fascination with science and medicine has grown. 

She and Lance rise from the table as one without even meaning to, crowding close to Azot. 

“What’s going on, Doc?” Lance asks quietly. He nods his head back toward their bedroom; the only private place they have, really. “Do we need to…?”

Azot doesn’t bother with his usual scowl or eyeroll at the nickname. Instead his gaze flickers briefly over their shoulders to the children. “Perhaps.” His voice is pitched low. “I thought you would wish to be informed of the Emperor's intention to summon you soon. I am not certain when, however I must—”

He doesn’t get any more than that out before the heavy clanking of the door locks interrupts them yet again. 

Pidge turns to the door as it raises, still scowling and resisting the urge to grab for Lance’s hand. Their relationship is not something for the guards to scoff at. It’s theirs. All these years, and they’ve learned how to keep as much of it to themselves as they can. Except around Doctor Azot. But even years of training herself not to reach out when they’re being watched doesn’t mean she doesn’t want to. 

She may be strong, but she’s still human. 

She has the comfort of Lance’s eyes meeting hers, at least, as the guards swarm in. They only ever bother to come in force like this anymore for one reason. 

‘Not certain when’ means now, apparently, but Azot looks startled, for a moment, before he buries it and is back to only his usual grumpiness.

“The Emperor has requested your presence,” one of the guards announces. “Both of you.” He’s already smirking, and Pidge recognizes him. She’s never liked him. 

“Mom?” Veronica asks. She hasn’t moved from the table, but her voice is pitched high and worried. Sam and Elia are staring. Rys’s cat-like ears have laid back as he reaches to pick up Leo from his makeshift highchair. 

“It’s okay,” Pidge says automatically.

A dash of movement, and arms wrap around her legs—Ramie, burying his face in her stomach.

“We’ll be back,” Lance is saying. He reaches down to help pull Ramie gently off; better they do it than the guards. “Don’t worry, buddy.”

“Sam,” Pidge says. She doesn’t have to say anymore. He nods, knowing it’s his job to take care of his siblings until they return.

Doctor Azot follows them as they’re corralled from their quarters, as if he plans to accompany them to the throne room. It wouldn’t be the first time, but this time something is different.

She may be seeing things, but she thinks maybe something that looks like an apology flashes across his face.

***

_ Fifteen Years Ago _

Lance isn’t sure how many hours are lost to sleep, but the next time the door unlocking wakes him he staggers to his feet, yanking the breathing device from his face and shoving it under a pillow. It’s immediately harder to breathe, but it’s better than letting the guards who strapped him to that table catch him still down and out after what they did to him. 

He won’t give them the satisfaction. He tries to hold his breath to minimize the trembling still wracking his body, but it only works to an extent. 

It all comes rushing out anyway when it isn’t only the guards on the other side of the door, but a familiar form he’s waited to see for more than a dozen days now. 

“Pidge…!”

She hurries toward him, almost but not quite avoiding the push one of the guards gives her. They fall into each other as the door closes, barely staying upright as they cling to each other. 

There are tears on his neck. But surely the subjugation of an innocent planet wouldn’t take that long. 

Not the way Sendak does it.

“What happened?” he asks, anxious. “D-did Sendak…?”

Pidge shakes her head against him. “N-no, I mean...I mean yes, there was a planet, but that was more than a movement ago. I just...there were a lot of tests too, in the lab. The Doc kept me in the cell there, I just...I’m just tired…”

Lance holds her tight, still afraid he might fall over himself if he doesn’t. He doesn’t say anything else, letting her release the tension in her body with the tears. 

There’s something else. He can feel it. 

“What about you?” Pidge asks suddenly. She pulls back enough to look at him, thankfully still holding on. “You’re shaking…”

“I-It’s nothing, I just kinda...made the guards mad again.”

She raises an eyebrow at him, huffing quietly and swiping at her nose with a sniff. “Usually they kick you around.”

Lance winces. “Oh, they did that too.”

She’s scowling at him. He hates it when she does that. They’re in this together; he doesn’t want to make her do that. 

“What did they…?”

He suspects she’s stalling, but he isn’t going to lie. 

“One of those...things we’ve heard about. That the druids used to use to, uh...interrogate people. They’re just kind of sitting around now, and you don’t need a druid to make them work, apparently; just some kind of good old fashioned energy. I guess the guards got bored…” He trails off, realizing he’s losing his breath again. He was so focused on Pidge he nearly forgot how hard it was to get air. 

“Quiznak,” Pidge murmurs. She pushes him gently backward until his legs nudge the bed, urging him to sit. 

She should be angrier. Either at him, or the guards; something. Something is wrong. She sits beside him, absently stroking his back. Her eyes have fixed on some invisible point on the floor. 

“Pidge, what’s going on?” he asks. 

After a long moment her mouth opens, but all that comes out is a sob. 

A hand goes around her stomach, her fingers twisting in her black jumpsuit so tightly her knuckles go white. 

“Oh…” Lance breathes weakly. 

Another sob. “N-nothing to...stall anymore.”

He has to catch Pidge and pull her back against him to keep her from tipping off the edge of the bed. He rocks her even though he’s still trembling himself. 

“Oh...god.” 

All of the distraction tactics...all of the desperate hoping over all these months that somehow at least one of them was infirtile anyway and it wouldn't matter...hoping they wouldn’t have to bring a child into this reality...all of that’s over now.

It’s not about them anymore. 

***

_ Now _

“Paladins! It has been far too long. So few planets to subjugate in recent deca-phoebes, with practically the known universe under my rule.”

Sendak is far too happy, already on his feet before his throne when they’re brought in, and Lance knows from experience that it’s never a good sign when Sendak is happy. 

Experience has also taught him to keep his mouth shut, as much as he hates it. But if he doesn’t, Pidge certainly won’t. 

“No greeting for your Emperor?” Sendak taunts. 

At a nod, the guards behind them kick their knees out from under them. At least they have the decency to catch Pidge’s arms and keep her from going down too hard in her condition--arms she yanks away from them as soon as she’s down--but Lance receives no such assistance. 

He could say he’s used to it, but his knees protest otherwise. 

“How are my favorite servants, Doctor?”

Azot clears his throat from where he stands off to the side, hands folded behind his back. 

“In good health to serve you, Your Excellency, and the female is carrying an especially valuable specimen that is to be born within just a few movements. The male continues to provide quality genetic material.”

“Good, good. And the juveniles?”

Lance freezes, any mention of the children putting him immediately on edge. He can feel Pidge stiffen beside him even without touching her. 

“Also in good health to serve.” Is it just him, or did Azot hesitate?

“Good,” Sendak practically purrs. “Because they _ will  _ serve me.” 

What?

Sendak stalks down the steps to be closer to them, sneering. A quick glance tells Lance that Pidge is already glaring daggers, and he’s certain his own expression can’t be far off.

“Over the deca-phoebes I’ve put a great deal of thought into how they could best serve me, in fact. I came to the conclusion that while my empire is mighty and fear  _ is _ the surest way to maintain power, there is nothing wrong with bestowing appropriate gifts on the loyal. Indeed, I’ve taken up this practice in the past.”

Lance can’t breathe. From the corner of his eye he catches the movement of one of Pidge’s hands going instinctively to her belly, but Sendak has never deigned to call them here himself before to tell them when there are already plans for their unborn children. If they ever have a warning, it’s from Doc. 

Which means this is different.

Sendak is pacing, enjoying the sound of his own voice as always. “In two phoebes, we will be passing through the territory of one of my longest-serving generals. His own scientists have been asking for new specimens and I had already planned to give him one of the youngest earthling hybrids borne by one of the other slaves on board, but...well...wouldn’t throwing in one of the last remaining full-blooded earthlings be an appropriate gift for one who has served so long?”

No…

“Doctor, the oldest male offspring is certainly old enough to be free of the need for parental care, am I correct? He’s nearly mature by our standards.”

“Nearly,” Azot hedges.

“Perfect—“

“No!” Lance cries.

“You can’t do that!” Pidge echoes beside him. 

Their silence broken, Lance is already on his feet. Only an arm’s length apart from when they were forced to the ground, Pidge’s fingers are dug into his sleeve as she tries to get up. Lance moves to help her but there are already guards on him, yanking his arms down and back and wrenching his shoulder. 

“Your Excellency,” Azot begins slowly. “My work…”

“You have had plenty of time to study him, Doctor, and you have the other two offspring and hybrids. And they can have more! Now that the male is nearing maturity he should be of more use. Some of the others, too, certainly. I’ve already made arrangements for the oldest half-blood.” Sendak smirks as he locks eyes with Lance. “In another deca-phoebe or more she’ll be given to regent Dogek of Riaf III as a bride. He’s been especially loyal and as he is not Galra himself, it won’t matter to him that her blood is tainted.”

Elia. Sam. Not if he has anything to say about it. 

Lance seethes through his teeth. “If anyone touches then...!”

Pidge manages to get the rest of the way to her feet. She’s being held back as he is, but it doesn’t keep her from surging forward a step. “Come here and I’ll take your other eye, you filthy, arrogant…!”

Normally Lance would stop her. Not today. His fingers twitch, itching to get a blow in that he knows he’ll never be allowed. 

Sendak goes on as if they haven’t spoken, looking at Pidge now. 

“And  _ my _ son will be conscripted to my military as soon as he is of age.”

“Rys is  _ not _ your son,” Pidge spits. “You’ve never even met him.”

Sendak cocks his head at her. “What sort of name is that for a Galra? It will have to be changed before he serves, of course.”

He should keep his mouth shut. They should stop before they’ve gone too far. Maybe they’ve gone too far already. But everything inside him is shaking and he can’t make it stop.

This is too much. They may have a plan for escape, to finally get out of here, but what is that freedom without their children? If they can’t make it happen soon enough…

“You’re not changing anyone’s name. You’re not taking any of them.”

He wanted it to sound dangerous. Instead Lance is afraid it sounds breathless and pitiful when it comes out of his mouth.

Sendak laughs. “I’m not? I was under the impression I was the Emperor here.”

He’s so close. Sendak has made it to the bottom of the steps, just a few feet away. If only he could…

Sendak shakes his head. “Come now, were you under the impression that your offspring were yours? If you are mine to do with as I please, paladins, then so are they.”

Lance takes the chance. When Sendak turns away he lunges, yanking at the arms holding him, not even sure what his plan is. There is no plan. All he wants is for Sendak to  _ hurt _ . Years of suppressed aggression in one violent movement that goes nowhere. Blocked and beaten back by the guards surrounding him as an incoherent scream of rage from Pidge echoes through the throne room. 

He wants to find her, but he can’t. Not from the ground. His head is spinning and he isn’t sure how he ended up there. His ribs hurt. 

Sendak is laughing again. “See to their punishment. Get them out of my sight.” 

After that Lance only remembers the dizzying journey through the corridors, being dragged behind the guards, and the cold of the table and the pain searing his nerves.

He can’t breathe. There’s no air. Oh god, his chest is on fire, there’s no air...

He can’t scream. It hurts so much but he can’t scream anymore. Pidge screams for him. Begging them to stop. 

But at some point even she goes silent. 

***

Pidge wakes, as she’s become so accustomed to, with Doctor Azot hovering over her and a throat tight with panic. 

“Lance…!” 

She tries to sit up from the exam table, but he holds her down by a shoulder. And it’s easy. Her head only rises a few inches, but it’s enough to make her head spin. 

“He will live, as usual,” Azot huffs. “Calm yourself; you are in need of more medical attention than your mate is at the moment.”

“Where…?” She swallows, trying to speak through a dry throat. The more she looks around, the less the spinning happens and the more she regains her equilibrium. But Lance is still nowhere to be seen in the lab.

“He has been returned to your quarters with a breathing monitor. He will be fine. I would be more concerned about the fact that the two of you have yet to learn how to avoid these instances.”

Azot putters around the exam table, peering at the readings on the monitors next to her and eventually helping her into a sitting position. “You will also be fine. You lost consciousness from the upset, but you are stable now. This genetic combination seems to be more draining on your physiology than the others we have tried, but I believe the support treatment I have given you will help.”

Pidge grips the edge of the table, breathing through the last of the dizziness and nausea. 

“Why do you even care, Doc?” she asks wearily.

She doesn’t mean about the baby, or the general wellbeing of his test subjects. Why does he care if they’ve accepted their fate?

Azot seems to understand what she’s asking as he blinks at her. “Because your behavior only causes problems, and it...would be unfortunate if anything were to happen to you.”

“Because you wouldn’t have anyone to experiment on?” she retorts.

He doesn’t answer, wordlessly handing her a packet of water from the stash under one of the lab benches—from inside some contraption he’s rigged there to keep it cold. Galra usually don’t care if their drinks are cold, but Azot seems to have an affinity for cold water ever since he learned it was a part of some Earth cultures. 

Pidge sips slowly through the small straw built into the packet, closing her eyes to steady herself.

“Earlier...were you trying to warn us?” she asks. 

“Of course,” Azot grumbles. “Such shocks are not healthy for a female with child...”

“You were! There has to be more to it than that. You…”

He won’t look at her, and things start to fall into place. 

“Last time I had twins, you warned me they were going to take Ramie’s sister  _ months _ before it happened. You…” Realization turns to sudden anger. “Then you took Esther when she was  _ born _ ! Did you think that would hurt less than just letting us have some time with her?”

Azot shuffles away. “It is always in a scientist’s best interests to consider both the physical and mental health of—“

“It didn’t hurt less!”

He glares suddenly, turning on her. “I would be careful of your tone, earthling. I can still have you punished for such insolence. Or see to it you are punished after the child is born.”

Pidge snorts. “But you won’t. I may not know you as well as I thought I did, but I know you wouldn’t do it.”

And she realizes she really doesn’t believe he would. Azot has never deliberately hurt them. Not physically. 

He grumbles again, deliberately clanking tools on the next table as he straightens it and not giving a direct answer to that. “I am beginning to think you earthlings will never truly understand your place.”

“As what?” Pidge scoffs. “Slaves? Property? Experiments? God help me if I ever do!”

“Perhaps you  _ should _ petition your deity to help you if you have one, to help you understand!” He’s still facing away from her, shoulders hunched and tense, and it’s the angriest she’s ever seen him. Azot is a grumbler, not a shouter. But he’s shouting. “It would save yourself and your mate a considerable amount of pain. There is only so much that I can do to help you!”

She can’t help but stare at him for a long moment. “So you  _ are _ trying to help? If…” 

All of the times he’s helped her find books and other materials for the children. The times he’s tried to keep them out of trouble. The way he dotes on them all in his own gruff way...what if there’s more to it than she thought? If after all these years, it’s more than just scientific interest?

“If you were trying to help why didn’t it occur to you to  _ ask _ what would actually be helpful!” she sputters. “You’re a scientist; you know you can’t just-just...assume things! We’re not like you, and you know that!”

Azot still doesn’t answer. The anger is gone as quickly as it came. Instead he pulls a data chip from his pocket—the kind that can be read by the limited-functionality tablet they have in their quarters for the children—offering it to her and changing the subject. 

“Take this to the boy; I am sure by now that he has nearly finished the medical texts I last sent for him.”

Pidge glares, swallowing around the lump that’s appeared in her throat. “Why does it matter if you’re just going to let Sendak take him from us?”

Azot lets out a quiet breath, holding the chip out closer to her. “Will you take it?”

She blinks, caught off guard by words that she once, long ago, would have thought nothing of.  _ Will you _ . A choice. An offer of autonomy, however small. Not something given to her often anymore. Not from the rest of their captors, and certainly not from Azot.

She finds herself nodding, reaching for the chip. Azot only meets her eyes for a moment, but she feels as if he’s told her something important. 

***

When they return her to their quarters, Pidge nearly panics when at first she only sees Rys watching the younger children in the common room. 

“Where are Sam and Elia?” she asks. She feels guilty for asking that first when Ramie and Veronica are latching onto her, but…

“They’re in your room with Dad,” Rys tells her, shifting Leo higher on his shoulder.

“Is he awake?”

“I don’t think so…”

Pidge holds onto the kids at her legs with one arm, but reaches out with the other to envelop Rys and Leo, too. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, Mom, we’re fine…” Rys trails. It comes out embarrassed—he’s twelve, after all—but he doesn’t pull away. 

In their bedroom Lance is still unconscious, propped up on the pillows they have to help the monitor hooked over his ears in making it easier for him to breathe. A damp cloth has been draped over his forehead, and the soft puffing of air from the tubes in his nose is one of the only sounds. Elia sits hunched and cross legged at the foot of the bed, Sam hovering at the head. 

“Hey…” Pidge says. She’s trying not to startle them, but Elia jolts anyway. “Sorry...how is he?”

Sam drops onto the edge of the bed. “Doc said he’d be fine, but the monitor’s been working really hard…” His fingers are laced together in his lap, squeezing and unsqueezing. A nervous habit he developed a long time ago. He’s trying not to let on that he’s scared. 

It probably doesn’t help that he’s read enough medical texts to dream up a thousand possible complications.

“I’m sure Doc is right,” Pidge assures them gently. “Why don’t you two go out there with the others? I can stay with him from here.”

“Are you okay?” Elia asks.

“I’m fine.” Elia catches a quick hug on the way out, but she manages to stop Sam for a moment longer. “Thank you. You did a good job,” she says, nodding to Lance on the bed.

“I thought that was what you did last time,” he says. “With the pillows. It was a long time ago, but...and it’s supposed to be easier for most species to breathe more upright cause of the...diaphragm and all.”

“Right.” Not that he should have had to take care of his own injured father. Not at barely fifteen. 

She pulls him into a tight hug that he squirms out of; his quiet yelp almost drowns out the mumbled moans coming from the bed. 

“Is he waking up?” Sam asks. His eyebrows go up. “I can get some water.”

“Not right now. I’ll come get some when he’s more awake, okay? Thank you…”

When she’s alone with Lance, Pidge slides into the bed beside him to rest her head on his shoulder to wait. He’s a little more pale than she’d like, but it’s nothing she’s hasn’t seen before and he seems to be coming around.

She isn’t aware she started to drift until a pair of unsteady lips press a kiss into her hair. 

When she sits up, mildly startled, Lance is smiling at her groggily. “We made trouble again.”

Pidge smiles back, but the amusement only lasts a moment before it fades like so much smoke. She curls up to him again, wishing she could press away the trembling aftershocks of the table shaking through his body with the warmth of her own and wishing she could erase the last few vargas altogether.

“What are we going to do?” she asks.

She already knows the answer. He knows she does. But she needs someone to say it. 

“We do what we said we’d...do before we even... _ had  _ Sam,” Lance manages, slowly and between labored breaths. “Everything we can to get him...and the other kids... _ out _ of here.”


End file.
